Henry David Thoreau Quotations: HUMANKIND
The philanthropist too often surrounds mankind with the remembrance of his own castoff griefs as an atmosphere, and calls it sympathy.—Walden
The philosophy and poetry and religion of such a mankind are not worth the dust of a puffball.—"Life without Principle"
The poet says the proper study of mankind is man. I say study to forget all that—take wider views of the universe.—Journal, 2 April 1852
The social condition of genius is the same in all ages. Aeschylus was undoubtedly alone and without sympathy in his simple reverence for the mystery of the universe.—Journal, 29 January 1840
The universe seems bankrupt as soon as we begin to discuss the character of individuals.—A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
The vice of manners is that they are continually deserted by the character. They are castoff clothes or shells claiming the respect of the living creature.—Journal, 16 February 1851
The world rests on principles.—Thoreau to H. G. O. Blake, 19 December 1854
There are enough who will flatter me with sweet words, and anon use bitter ones to balance them, but they are not my friends. Simple sincerity and truth are rare indeed.—Journal, 9 September 1852
There are new and patented inventions in this shape, purporting to be for the elevation of the race, which many a pure scholar and genius who has learned to read is for a moment deceived by, and finds himself reading a horse-rake, or spinning-jenny, or wooden nutmeg, or oak-leaf cigar, or steam-power press, or kitchen range, perchance, when he was seeking serene and biblical truths.—A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers
There are some who never do or say anything, whose life merely excites expectation. Their excellence reaches no further than a gesture or mode of carrying themselves. They are a sash dangling from the waist, or a sculptured war-club over the shoulder. They are like fine-edged tools gradually becoming rusty in a shop-window. I like as well, if not better, to see a piece of iron or steel, out of which many such tools will be made, or the bush-whack in a man’s hand.—Journal, 10 March 1859
